Facilitating test failover using a thin provisioned virtual machine created from a snapshot

ABSTRACT

Systems and methods for facilitating test failover on a remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine. A snapshot is created of a remote virtual machine disk, the remote virtual machine disk protecting a source virtual machine disk. An instant, thin provisioned virtual machine is created from the snapshot, and the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine is powered on based on a received instruction to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine thereby creating a running instance of a virtual machine, thereby facilitating test failover on the remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application relates to and claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(e) to U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 61/989,155, titled “Methods and apparatus for replicated data test failover,” which is filed on May 6, 2014 and is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.

FIELD

The subject matter disclosed in this application generally relates to computerized methods and computer apparatus for test failover of replicated data.

BACKGROUND

Traditionally, validating data on a virtual machine involved making a full copy of the virtual machine. Making a full copy of the virtual machine to validate the contents takes a long time and can defeat the purpose of validation.

SUMMARY

Systems and methods are disclosed for facilitating test failover on a remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine. In some embodiments, the systems and methods comprise transmitting an instruction, by a computing device, to a remote hypervisor to create a snapshot of a remote virtual machine disk, the remote virtual machine disk protecting a source virtual machine disk. In some embodiments, protecting the source virtual machine disk comprises receiving, by the computing device, data indicative of a full backup of a source virtual machine disk, the source virtual machine disk including data corresponding to the source virtual machine and an associated source virtual machine metadata; and creating from the full backup, by the computing device, the remote virtual machine and a remote virtual machine disk including data from the source virtual machine. In some embodiments, the systems and methods disclosed herein further comprise transmitting a second instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to create an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot, wherein creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot further comprises creating a copy-on-write reference virtual disk from the snapshot, the copy-on-write reference virtual disk including a reference to the remote virtual machine disk; and transmitting a third instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine based on a received instruction to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine thereby creating a running instance of a virtual machine, thereby facilitating test failover on the remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine.

In some embodiments, protecting the source virtual machine disk further comprises updating, by the computing device, the remote virtual machine disk during a subsequent backup with deduplicated data, the deduplicated data associated with data corresponding to the source virtual machine disk at a first point time that is different than data corresponding to a the source virtual machine disk at a prior point in time.

In some embodiments, the snapshot comprises a copy of a state of the remote virtual machine disk at a time corresponding to a prior successful replication.

In some embodiments, the systems and methods disclosed herein further comprise transmitting an instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to store modifications made to the remote virtual machine after creating the snapshot to delta files such that the newer modification do not affect the contents of the remote virtual machine disks. In some embodiments, the delta files include references to the remote virtual machine disks.

In some embodiments, the systems and methods described herein further comprise transmitting an instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to catalog, by the computing device, an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine when the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine is powered on such that the user or the computing device can identify the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image.

In some embodiments, the systems and methods described herein further comprise receiving an instruction, by the computing device, to delete data associated with the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine, wherein deleting the data associated with the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine comprises identifying the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine data. In some embodiments, creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine comprises creating instant, thin provisioned virtual machine using an application programming interface. In some embodiments, the systems and methods described herein are used for disaster recovery.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES

Various objectives, features, and advantages of the disclosed subject matter can be more fully appreciated with reference to the following detailed description of the disclosed subject matter when considered in connection with the following drawings, in which like reference numerals identify like elements.

FIG. 1 is an exemplary diagram of a replication process to a remote performance pool in accordance with some embodiments.

FIG. 2 is an exemplary diagram of a replication process to a remote virtual machine datastore in accordance with some embodiments.

FIG. 3 is an exemplary diagram of a test failover process for remote performance pool replication in accordance with some embodiments.

FIG. 4 is an exemplary diagram of a test failover process for a remote virtual machine datastore replication in accordance with some embodiments.

FIG. 5 is an exemplary diagram of a computerized method for a test failover process for a remote virtual machine datastore replication in accordance with some embodiments.

DESCRIPTION

In the following description, numerous specific details are set forth regarding the systems and methods of the disclosed subject matter and the environment in which such systems and methods may operate, etc., in order to provide a thorough understanding of the disclosed subject matter. It will be apparent to one skilled in the art, however, that the disclosed subject matter may be practiced without such specific details, and that certain features, which are well known in the art, are not described in detail in order to avoid unnecessary complication of the disclosed subject matter. In addition, it will be understood that the embodiments provided below are exemplary, and that it is contemplated that there are other systems and methods that are within the scope of the disclosed subject matter.

The techniques described herein provide for a test failover capability when using virtual machine metadata (e.g., datastores). These and other capabilities of the disclosed subject matter will be more fully understood after a review of the following figures and detailed description. It is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology employed herein are for the purpose of description and should not be regarded as limiting.

Test failover can refer to a capability that allows quick validation of replicated data for a virtual machine without disrupting the forward replication of the virtual machine. The replicated data can be used for emergency failovers of the virtual machine. Deduplicated asynchronous replication of virtual machines can be performed to two different target types—Remote performance pools (referred as ReadyVolume replication in this document) and Remote Virtual Machine datastores. For example, if using VMWare ESX the replication can be performed to Remote ESX datastores (referred as ReadyVM replication in this document).

A remote performance pool is, for example, a storage pool within a Copy Data Storage (CDS) System at the remote side, so a ReadyVolume replication creates a replicated copy of a source virtual machine in the remote CDS. In case of ReadyVM, for example, a source virtual machine is replicated to disks of a pre-created virtual machine at the remote side and underlying disks of the remote virtual machine are located in datastores accessible from an ESX host. These datastores could reside on disks outside storage pools managed by the CDS.

For performing validation of replicated data, it is often desirable for a test failover operation to be quick and non-disruptive so that it allows forward replication to proceed despite test failover being performed on the application.

Previous techniques validated readyvm replicated data by creating a full clone of the pre-created remote VM that was used as replication target. Based on the size of the virtual machine, this operation could take a very long time making it impractical to use this as a solution to validate the data.

Using the techniques described herein, test failover support is provided to automatically create an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine (hereinafter also referred to as “linked clone”) that creates an instant copy of the pre-created remote VM from the last replicated state of the source virtual machine without disrupting forward replication and in a quick and efficient manner. A full clone is an independent copy of a virtual machine that does not share anything with the parent virtual machine, once the cloning process is complete. A linked clone is a dependent copy that shares virtual disks with the parent virtual machine in an ongoing manner. Since linked clone references the virtual disks of the parent virtual machine, it must have access to the parent virtual machine disks.

FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary diagram of a replication process from a local site to a remote site, such as a remote performance pool (e.g., a ReadyVolume) in accordance with some embodiments.

Source VM 3601 is the source virtual machine being replicated, with its volumes 3604 coming from source datastore 3602. Source datastore 3602 is one type of source virtual machine metadata. Source ESX 3603 is a hypervisor (e.g., ESX) hosting this VM. ESX is a vmware hypervisor that manages physical hardware resources and provides virtual resources for guest virtual machines running on it. Virtual backup appliances are described in more detail in U.S. application Ser. No. 14/491,240, titled “Improved Data Replication System,” filed Sep. 19, 2014, the contents of which are incorporated herein in its entirety.

As part of the replication process, data can move between various tiers of storage in source content data storage (“CDS”) 3608 as shown in FIG. 1 (e.g., snapshots, deduplicated snapshots, etc.). Source staging disks 3605 maintains a current copy of the source VM by copying modified extents from the source VM 3601 in each replication cycle (e.g., hourly, daily, and/or however configured by the system). In some embodiments, as part of each incremental replication cycle, CDS receives a list of changed blocks (e.g., extents) from a source virtual machine using APIs (e.g., provided by VMWare). It copies only these modified blocks from source virtual machine into the staging disks in CDS. Once the copy from the source vmdk volumes 3604 to the source staging disks 3605 is complete, a copy-on-write snapshot of source staging disks 3605 is created as source snapshot 3606 (e.g., to be used as a reference for future replication cycles). Source snapshot 3606 is deduplicated and unique blocks are stored in source deduplicated storage 3607. In some embodiments, the source snapshot 3606 and the source dedup 3607 are a backup of the source VM 3601.

Unique blocks that are not already present at the remote dedup pool 3610 are sent over the network (e.g., a cloud network) to remote dedup pool 3610 located in remote CDS 3609. Since deduplicated storage (e.g., remote dedup 3610) usually does not maintain data in a readily restorable format, these objects are rehydrated (e.g., expanded from the deduplicated data into a full-fledged/expanded staging disk) for quick access into remote staging disk 3611 that resides in a performance storage pool of remote CDS 3609. A copy-on-write snapshot of 3611 is created as remote snapshot 3612 to be used as a reference of point-in-time copy of the source virtual machine 3601. Details of the newly created snapshot and the linked clone are cataloged in the CDS database as a reference for cleaning them up in future as part of delete test failover operation.

FIG. 2 is an exemplary diagram of a replication process to a remote virtual machine datastore (e.g., ReadyVM) in accordance with some embodiments.

Source VM 3601 is the source virtual machine being replicated, with its volumes 3604 coming from source datastore 3602. Source ESX 3603 is the ESX hosting this VM. Source staging disks 3605 maintains a current copy of the source VM by copying modified extents from the source VM 3601 in each replication cycle. Once the copy from the source vmdk volumes 3604 to the source staging disks 3605 is complete, a copy-on-write snapshot of source staging disks 3605 is created as source snapshot 3606 (e.g., to be used as a reference for future replication cycles). Source snapshot 3606 is deduplicated and unique blocks are stored in source deduplicated storage 3607. Unique blocks that are not already present at the remote dedup pool 3610 are sent over the network (e.g., a cloud network) to remote dedup pool 3610 located in remote CDS 3609. The target used for creating readily accessible objects from 3601 varies, as explained further below.

As part of pre-replication activity, a remote VM 3623 can be created with a similar layout as source VM 3601, as replication target, with remote ESX 3621 and remote datastores 3622 (e.g., which can be configured by a user). In some examples, at this point there is no data in the remote VM 3623 after the initial creation. During replication, data is copied from remote dedup storage 3610 into the remote vmdk volumes 3624 of the remote VM 3623. The term “vmdk” refers to the virtual machine disk file which can be synonymous to a real physical disk for a physical server. In the case of a virtual machine, these can be just files residing in the datastore but presented as disks to the virtual machine. At the end of each replication cycle, remote VM 3623 reflects exact point in time state of the source virtual machine 3601, when replication was started.

In the first replication of the initial data from the remote dedup 3610 to the remote VM 3623, instead of saving the data as actual disks, the data is populated into the remote VMDK volumes 3624 (e.g., by rehydrating the data into the remote vmdk volumes 3624). In subsequent replications, incremental changes are applied to the remote VM 3623. In some embodiments, for populating remote virtual machine with the changes, a snapshot of the remote virtual machine is created using APIs and the changed extents are rehydrated and copied to the snapshot. Once the copy is complete, the remote virtual machine is reverted back from this snapshot. At the end of this operation, the snapshot and remote virtual machine have the same contents.

FIG. 3 is an exemplary diagram of the test failover process for remote performance pool (e.g., readyvolume) replication in accordance with some embodiments. In some examples, the remote snapshot 3612 exists, and it is desirable to check the remote snapshot 3612 to confirm it is ready for use (e.g., for disaster recovery).

A test failover reference copy-on-write copy 3631 is created from the last replicated snapshot 3612. In some embodiments, the copy 3631 is a think copy of 3612 (e.g., where remote snapshot 3612 is a thin copy of remote staging disks 3611). The test failover reference 3631 is mapped to the remote ESX host 3633 (e.g., such that there is no data copy). The newly presented disks 3632 at remote ESX 3633 are then mapped using raw device mapping technology to the remote VM 3635. The Remote VM 3635 now could scan and access the virtual devices 3634 backed by the underlying real test failover reference disks 3631 at the remote CDS 3609.

FIG. 4 is an exemplary diagram of the test failover process for a remote virtual machine datastore (e.g., readyvm) replication. In some embodiments, the test failover process can be used to perform a test failover in a VM environment of replicated data.

FIG. 4 includes remote ESX 3621, remote datastore 3622, remote VM 3623, remote vmdk volumes 3624, snapshot 3641, copy on write (COW) thin provisioned disks 3642, and linked clone VM 3643.

Referring to remote ESX 3621, remote ESX 3621 is a virtual hypervisor that manages physical resources such as CPU, memory and storage and provides a virtualization environment for the guest virtual machines to run. It accesses storage from remote datastore 3622 for providing virtual disk access to the virtual machines.

Referring to remote datastore 3622, remote datastore 3622 provides the underlying storage for virtual disk files 3624 of the remote virtual machine 3623. Each virtual machine treats virtual disk files as its disks and accesses them in a similar way as a physical servers accesses physical disks attached to it. ESX server could present files on datastore as virtual disks to the virtual machine or it could present real physical disks directly to a virtual machine as virtual disks. In this example, remote ESX server 3621 presents files on remote datastore 3622 as virtual disks to remote virtual machine 3623.

Referring to remote VM 3623, VM 3623 is a virtual machine that is created before starting replication, with the same configuration as the source virtual machine being replicated. First replication cycle copies the contents of source virtual machine to 3623 and subsequent replication cycles update it with the modifications from the source virtual machine by copying the incremental changes to it.

Referring to remote vmdk volumes 3624, vmdk volumes 3624 are the disks of the remote virtual machine 3623. Though the remote virtual machine treats them as physical disks, they can be virtual disks carved out of files from remote datastore 3622 and presented to remote virtual machine 3623 as virtual disks by the remote ESX host 3621.

Referring to snapshot 3641, snapshot 3641 is a snapshot of remote virtual machine 3623 that captures the point in time image of contents of the virtual machine, without creating a full copy of the remote vmdk volumes 3624. It maintains references to the remote vmdk volumes 3624 and any changes to the remote virtual machine after creating the snapshot 3641 are stored in separate delta files, so snapshot 3641 always reflects the point in time image of remote VM 3623 at the time of creating this snapshot.

Referring to COW Thin provisioned disks 3642, these disks are virtual disks of the newly created linked clone 3643 that are not fully populated by copying all the data from remote vmdk files 3624. Instead they maintain references to the vmdk files 3624. Any blocks of data modified in the linked clone VM 3643 are actually allocated and written to the disks 3642, while non-modified blocks would still point to the base vmdk disks 3624. Any modifications to the remote virtual machine 3623 after creating the snapshot are maintained in separate delta files, so the newer modifications would not affect the contents of the disks 3642 even though they reference the base vmdk disks 3624.

Referring to linked clone VM 3643, this VM is another virtual machine with its own virtual resources that looks very similar to the remote virtual machine 3623 with the only exception that its virtual disks are dependent on base vmdk volumes 3624. This virtual machine can be powered ON and used like any other physical or virtual host as long it is able to access its own virtual disks 3642 and base virtual disks 3624.

Referring to FIG. 4 generally, a new VM snapshot 3641 is created from the remote VM 3623. Since remote VM 3623 always maintains the point in time image of the source VM 3601 at the time of the last replication cycle, the new snapshot 3641 now reflects the last replicated version of source VM 3601. The new VM snapshot 3641 results in creating copy-on-write (“COW”) reference virtual disk files 3642. The test failover operation now creates a new linked clone VM 3643 using vmware API under the same remote ESX host 3621. Apart from using CPU and memory resources allotted by the remote ESX host 3621, it uses the snapshot virtual disk files 3642 as its storage. Since the linked clone 3643 is created in a powered off state, test failover operation now automatically powers it ON using another vmware API and it is now booted and ready for logging in to validate the data.

FIG. 5 is an exemplary diagram of a computerized method for a test failover process for a remote virtual machine datastore replication (e.g., ReadyVM) in accordance with some embodiments. In some embodiments, a VM of replicated data exists and the test failover is of the existing VM.

At the start of the test-failover, in step 3650, a new snapshot of the remote Virtual Machine is created. This step results in creating a quick point in time replica of the state of the virtual machine at the time of last successful replication. Any future replication cycles that result in writing new data to the remote virtual machine will not modify the contents of the newly created snapshot. Next, in step 3651, a new linked clone VM is created based off the snapshot created in previous snapshot. The new snapshot is powered on in step 3652 that provides the user with a virtual machine that represents the state of the source virtual machine at the time when last replication was successfully performed. At step 3653 the linked clone VM is cataloged (e.g., to reflect the fact that the VM is created and powered on). For example, the cataloged VM allows the linked clone VM to be shown to a user, used by the CDS, and/or the like. The cataloged VM also facilitates deletion of the linked image when requested by a user.

The subject matter described herein can be implemented in digital electronic circuitry, or in computer software, firmware, or hardware, including the structural means disclosed in this specification and structural equivalents thereof, or in combinations of them. The subject matter described herein can be implemented as one or more computer program products, such as one or more computer programs tangibly embodied in an information carrier (e.g., in a machine readable storage device), or embodied in a propagated signal, for execution by, or to control the operation of, data processing apparatus (e.g., a programmable processor, a computer, or multiple computers). A computer program (also known as a program, software, software application, or code) can be written in any form of programming language, including compiled or interpreted languages, and it can be deployed in any form, including as a stand-alone program or as a module, component, subroutine, or other unit suitable for use in a computing environment. A computer program does not necessarily correspond to a file. A program can be stored in a portion of a file that holds other programs or data, in a single file dedicated to the program in question, or in multiple coordinated files (e.g., files that store one or more modules, sub programs, or portions of code). A computer program can be deployed to be executed on one computer or on multiple computers at one site or distributed across multiple sites and interconnected by a communication network.

The processes and logic flows described in this specification, including the method steps of the subject matter described herein, can be performed by one or more programmable processors executing one or more computer programs to perform functions of the subject matter described herein by operating on input data and generating output. The processes and logic flows can also be performed by, and apparatus of the subject matter described herein can be implemented as, special purpose logic circuitry, e.g., an FPGA (field programmable gate array) or an ASIC (application specific integrated circuit).

Processors suitable for the execution of a computer program include, by way of example, both general and special purpose microprocessors, and any one or more processor of any kind of digital computer. Generally, a processor will receive instructions and data from a read only memory or a random access memory or both. The essential elements of a computer are a processor for executing instructions and one or more memory devices for storing instructions and data. Generally, a computer will also include, or be operatively coupled to receive data from or transfer data to, or both, one or more mass storage devices for storing data, e.g., magnetic, magneto optical disks, or optical disks. Information carriers suitable for embodying computer program instructions and data include all forms of nonvolatile memory, including by way of example semiconductor memory devices, (e.g., EPROM, EEPROM, and flash memory devices); magnetic disks, (e.g., internal hard disks or removable disks); magneto optical disks; and optical disks (e.g., CD and DVD disks). The processor and the memory can be supplemented by, or incorporated in, special purpose logic circuitry.

To provide for interaction with a user, the subject matter described herein can be implemented on a computer having a display device, e.g., a CRT (cathode ray tube) or LCD (liquid crystal display) monitor, for displaying information to the user and a keyboard and a pointing device, (e.g., a mouse or a trackball), by which the user can provide input to the computer. Other kinds of devices can be used to provide for interaction with a user as well. For example, feedback provided to the user can be any form of sensory feedback, (e.g., visual feedback, auditory feedback, or tactile feedback), and input from the user can be received in any form, including acoustic, speech, or tactile input.

The subject matter described herein can be implemented in a computing system that includes a back end component (e.g., a data server), a middleware component (e.g., an application server), or a front end component (e.g., a client computer having a graphical user interface or a web browser through which a user can interact with an implementation of the subject matter described herein), or any combination of such back end, middleware, and front end components. The components of the system can be interconnected by any form or medium of digital data communication, e.g., a communication network. Examples of communication networks include a local area network (“LAN”) and a wide area network (“WAN”), e.g., the Internet.

It is to be understood that the disclosed subject matter is not limited in its application to the details of construction and to the arrangements of the components set forth in the following description or illustrated in the drawings. The disclosed subject matter is capable of other embodiments and of being practiced and carried out in various ways. Also, it is to be understood that the phraseology and terminology employed herein are for the purpose of description and should not be regarded as limiting.

As such, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the conception, upon which this disclosure is based, may readily be utilized as a basis for the designing of other structures, methods, and systems for carrying out the several purposes of the disclosed subject matter. It is important, therefore, that the claims be regarded as including such equivalent constructions insofar as they do not depart from the spirit and scope of the disclosed subject matter.

Although the disclosed subject matter has been described and illustrated in the foregoing exemplary embodiments, it is understood that the present disclosure has been made only by way of example, and that numerous changes in the details of implementation of the disclosed subject matter may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the disclosed subject matter. 

We claim:
 1. A computerized method of facilitating test failover on a remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine, the method comprising: transmitting an instruction, by a computing device, to a remote hypervisor to create a snapshot of a remote virtual machine disk, the remote virtual machine disk protecting a source virtual machine disk, wherein protecting the source virtual machine disk comprises: receiving, by the computing device, data indicative of a full backup of the source virtual machine disk, the source virtual machine disk including data corresponding to a source virtual machine and an associated source virtual machine metadata; and creating from the full backup, by the computing device, a remote virtual machine and the remote virtual machine disk including data from the source virtual machine; transmitting a second instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to create an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot, wherein creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot further comprises creating a copy-on-write reference virtual disk from the snapshot, the copy-on-write reference virtual disk including a reference to the remote virtual machine disk; and transmitting a third instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine based on a received instruction to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine thereby creating a running instance of a virtual machine and facilitating test failover on the remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein protecting the source virtual machine disk further comprises updating, by the computing device, the remote virtual machine disk during a subsequent backup to the full backup with deduplicated data, the deduplicated data associated with data corresponding to the source virtual machine disk at a first point time associated with the subsequent backup that is different than data corresponding to the source virtual machine disk at a prior point in time, the prior point in time associated with one of: the full backup, and an interim backup after the full backup and before the subsequent backup.
 3. The method of claim 2, wherein the snapshot comprises a copy of a state of the remote virtual machine disk at a time corresponding to a successful replication associated with one of the full backup, the interim backup, and the subsequent backup.
 4. The method of claim 2, further comprising transmitting an instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to store modifications made to the remote virtual machine after creating the snapshot to delta files such that the modifications do not affect data stored on the remote virtual machine disks.
 5. The method of claim 4, wherein the delta files include references to the remote virtual machine disks.
 6. The method of claim 1, further comprising transmitting an instruction, by the computing device, to the remote hypervisor to catalog, by the computing device, an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine when the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine is powered on such that a user or the computing device can identify the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image.
 7. The method of claim 6, further comprising receiving an instruction, by the computing device, to delete data associated with the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine, wherein deleting the data associated with the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine comprises identifying the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine data.
 8. The method of claim 1, wherein creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine comprises creating instant, thin provisioned virtual machine using an application programming interface.
 9. The method of claim 1 further used for disaster recovery.
 10. A computing system for facilitating test failover on a remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine, the system comprising: a processor; and a memory coupled to the processor and including computer-readable instructions, that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to: transmit an instruction to a remote hypervisor to create a snapshot of a remote virtual machine disk, the remote virtual machine disk protecting a source virtual machine disk, wherein protecting the source virtual machine disk further causes the processor to: receive data indicative of a full backup of the source virtual machine disk, the source virtual machine disk including data corresponding to a source virtual machine and an associated source virtual machine metadata; and create from the full backup a remote virtual machine and the remote virtual machine disk including data from the source virtual machine; transmit a second instruction to the remote hypervisor to create an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot, wherein creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot further comprises creating a copy-on-write reference virtual disk from the snapshot, the copy-on-write reference virtual disk including a reference to the remote virtual machine disk; and transmit a third instruction to the remote hypervisor to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine based on a received instruction to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine, thereby creating a running instance of a virtual machine and facilitating test failover on the remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine.
 11. The system of claim 10, wherein protecting the source virtual machine disk further causes the processor to update the remote virtual machine disk during a subsequent backup to the full backup with deduplicated data, the deduplicated data associated with data corresponding to the source virtual machine disk at a first point time associated with the subsequent backup that is different than data corresponding to the source virtual machine disk at a prior point in time, the prior point in time associated with one of: the full backup, and an interim backup after the full backup and before the subsequent backup.
 12. The system of claim 11, wherein the snapshot comprises a copy of a state of the remote virtual machine disk at a time corresponding to a successful replication associated with one of the full backup, the interim backup, and the subsequent backup.
 13. The system of claim 11, wherein the processor is further caused to transmit an instruction to the remote hypervisor to store modifications made to the remote virtual machine after creating the snapshot to delta files such that the modifications do not affect data stored on the remote virtual machine disks.
 14. The system of claim 13, wherein the delta files include references to the remote virtual machine disks.
 15. The system of claim 10, wherein the processor is further caused to transmit an instruction, to the remote hypervisor to catalog an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine when the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine is powered on such that a user or the system can identify the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image.
 16. The system of claim 15, wherein the processor is further caused to receive an instruction, to delete data associated with the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine, wherein deleting the data associated with the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine comprises identifying the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine data.
 17. The system of claim 10, wherein creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine further causes the processor to create an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine using an application programming interface.
 18. The system of claim 10 further used for disaster recovery.
 19. A non-transitory computer readable medium having executable instructions operable to cause an apparatus to: transmit an instruction to a remote hypervisor to create a snapshot of a remote virtual machine disk, the remote virtual machine disk protecting a source virtual machine disk, wherein protecting the source virtual machine disk further causes the apparatus to: receive data indicative of a full backup of the source virtual machine disk, the source virtual machine disk including data corresponding to a source virtual machine and an associated source virtual machine metadata; and create from the full backup a remote virtual machine and the remote virtual machine disk including data from the source virtual machine; transmit a second instruction to the remote hypervisor to create an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot, wherein creating the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine from the snapshot further comprises creating a copy-on-write reference virtual disk from the snapshot, the copy-on-write reference virtual disk including a reference to the remote virtual machine disk; and transmit a third instruction to the remote hypervisor to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine based on a received instruction to power on the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine thereby creating a running instance of a virtual machine and facilitating test failover on the remote virtual machine without creating a full copy of the remote virtual machine.
 20. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the apparatus is further caused to transmit an instruction, to the remote hypervisor to catalog an instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image corresponding to the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine when the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine is powered on such that a user or the apparatus can identify the instant, thin provisioned virtual machine image. 